研究生英语精读教程第三版上unit two.docVIP

Unit two Text: Cancer Chemicals -Are We Going Too Far? Marla Cone Last year, California governor George Deukmejian called together many of the states best scientific minds to begin implementing Proposition 65, the states Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act. This new law bans industries from discharging chemical suspected of causing cancer (carcinogens) or birth defects into water supplies. Some claim it will also require warning labels on everything that might cause cancer. A day of esoteric science and incomprehensible jargon was predicted. But Bruce Ames, chairman of the department of biochemistry at the University of California at Berkeley, had plans to liven the proceedings. Walking into the room, Ames looked like the quintessential scientist: wire-rimmed bifocals, rumpled suit, tousled hair and a sallow complexion that showed he spent more time in his laboratory than in the California sunshine.As someone intoned about the mechanisms of carcinogenesis, Ames began to interject his own views. The whole world is chock-full of carcinogens, Ames declared.“ A beer, with its 700 parts per billion of formaldehyde and five parts per 100 of alcohol is a thousand times more hazardous than anything in the water. If you have beer on your breath, does that mean you have to warn everyone who comes within ten feet of you? In an era when headlines shout about the latest cancer scare, Ames has a different message: the levels of most man-made carcinogens are generally so low that any danger is trivial compared with the levels of natural carcinogens. Ames is not a quack. At age 59, he is one of the nations most respected authorities on carcinogenesis. His resume is packed with honors, including the Charles. Mott Prize from the General Motors Cancer Research Foundation, one of the most prestigious awards in cancer research, and membership in the National Academy of Sciences.Even his critics say the Ames test—his simple, inexpensive laboratory procedure that helps determi